Raynal at the beginning of the first volume of this work spoke about the “revolution in commerce” which the discovery of the New World caused and a close reading of this and the following passages shows that — in contrast to what has been frequently asser - ted — he didn't allude to the American Revolution and its possible consequences but had in mind a slow and gradual long-range development extending over three centuries.

His leading asser - tion is that in a scientific study of a physical system, space is not given as the spread across the system, as the naive view has it, but is given by the total structural behavior as determined by the boundary configuration of the system; and Aristotle's first succinct definition is: “topos is the inner boundary of what contains”